The Islands of India

India has two major island groups, plus many smaller islands along its coasts. The Andaman and Nicobar Islands lie in the Bay of Bengal, closer to South-East Asia than to mainland India, while the Lakshadweep Islands lie in the Arabian Sea, off the Kerala coast. Together with the mainland coastline, they give India a coastline of about 7,516.6 kilometres. The islands are small in land area but large in strategic and ecological importance, because they extend India's maritime reach and host ecosystems found nowhere else on the mainland.

The Andaman and Nicobar group consists of more than 500 islands, of which only a few dozen are inhabited. The Andamans lie in the north and the Nicobars in the south, separated by the Ten Degree Channel. The islands are the peaks of a submerged mountain range, with dense evergreen forests, coral reefs and mangroves. Their highest point is Saddle Peak in North Andaman. The group includes indigenous communities, notably the Great Andamanese, Onge, Jarawa and Sentinelese, whose protection raises sensitive questions: contact with outsiders can bring disease and disruption, so access to some tribal reserves is restricted by law.

Lakshadweep is very different: a group of coral atolls in the Arabian Sea, low-lying and formed from coral reefs rather than mountains. Its land is barely above sea level, its soil is thin, and fresh water comes mainly from rain and a fragile groundwater lens. Coconut, fishing and, increasingly, tourism support livelihoods, but the islands are highly vulnerable to storms, coral bleaching and sea-level rise. Because the islands are so low, even a small rise in sea level threatens homes, water supplies and infrastructure.

For civil studies, the islands illustrate how geography creates distinct policy problems. Port Blair in the Andamans and Kavaratti in Lakshadweep are administrative centres far from the mainland, so transport, supplies and disaster response cost more and take longer. At the same time, the islands sit on important sea routes and support rich marine biodiversity. Policy must therefore weigh strategic value, ecological fragility, tribal rights and the everyday needs of island residents together, rather than treating the islands as a smaller copy of the mainland.